Visual Memories
by heisey
Summary: The story of a day, almost five years after the bank, when Jim realizes he is losing his visual memories.


**Visual Memories**

Detective Jim Dunbar stood with his head bowed, listening intently as Detective Karen Bettancourt, his partner of almost four years, described the gruesome crime scene in the out-of-the-way alley between two vacant warehouses awaiting renovation.

"The DOA looks like – oh, man, he's just a kid, sixteen, maybe seventeen. Single GSW to the middle of the forehead. It looks like someone propped him up, sitting against the wall, after he was dead."

"Sexual posing?"

"Yeah, probably," Karen confirmed, then continued, "He's wearing a red T-shirt, nothing else. His legs are splayed out in front of him. And he's been – " her voice broke " – mutilated." She hoped Jim wouldn't demand a more detailed description, as he often did.

He didn't. Instead, he nodded grimly and said, "Let's get started on the canvass."

Back at the squad several hours later, Karen studied her partner from her desk next to his. Since losing his sight, Jim had perfected an impassive expression which prevented most people from reading him. It was his way of equalizing things, Karen had decided, since he couldn't read other people's expressions. Still, four years' experience observing her partner left Karen with no doubt that something was troubling him.

She rolled her chair closer to his desk. "You OK?" she asked.

The response was automatic and expected. "Yeah, I'm fine."

"You sure about that?" she prodded.

Jim groaned inwardly. It had been a long time since he'd been able to b.s. Karen. He doubted he'd ever been able to do it. "I'm just having a little trouble visualizing the scene," he told her. "It's nothing."

"OK," she answered doubtfully. "You know, it was pretty bad. Maybe it's just as well – "

"Dammit, Karen, don't patronize me," he snapped, turning away from her.

Taken aback by his sudden anger, Karen rolled her chair back to her desk. If he didn't want to talk about what was making him so touchy, that was just fine with her. He could deal with it by himself.

Jim stood up abruptly and slapped his thigh to signal Hank. "I'm taking Hank out, then we can head over to the ME's office."

"OK."

Jim left the 8th Precinct and headed for the nearby park, where he found a vacant bench and sat down. He ran his hand through Hank's thick coat as he tried to understand what was happening. He'd told Karen he was having "a little trouble" visualizing the crime scene, but that was only half true. Karen's description hadn't evoked any mental images at all. He got the idea of "16-year-old kid brutally killed and sexually posed after death," all right, but none of those words conjured up any images in his mind. The crime scene was the smell of the garbage and litter in the alley, the uneven asphalt under his feet, the damp chill of an early-morning call, the break in Karen's voice as she described the DOA. He focused on one detail Karen had mentioned: the kid was wearing a red T-shirt. He knew what a T-shirt was, but what was red? He tried to think of something red. An apple was red, wasn't it? An image appeared fleetingly in his mind, then, like a slide flashed too quickly on a screen, it was gone. An apple wasn't red anymore. It was the smooth roundness of its shape in his hands, its cool crispness when he took that first bite, its sweet-tart taste, the juice running down his chin.

A feeling of loss threatened to overwhelm him. He'd thought he'd already lost everything he was going to lose. He wasn't ready for this. But, he reminded himself, he knew it was going to happen. They told him about it in rehab. Without new visual input to reinforce them, visual memories faded over time. Now it was happening to him.

Maybe Karen was right. Maybe he should be glad this crime scene hadn't put a "nasty image" in his head. But still. . . . He suddenly wondered how long he had been sitting there. He checked his watch. Twenty minutes. Shit. Footsteps approached – Karen's footsteps. "We should get going," she said.

"Yeah."

Sitting in the passenger seat of the unmarked on the way to the ME's office, Jim rested his chin on his folded hands. Karen was giving him the silent treatment, of course. He deserved it. He knew he would have to apologize eventually and let her in on what was happening to him, because it could affect their work. But not yet. He sighed inwardly. He could never get away with anything with Karen, any more than he could with Christie. He sometimes thought having a female partner was like having a second wife, only without sharing a bed. The two of them sure kept him in line, he thought ruefully. And the two women had become unlikely friends, seemingly united only by their shared complaints about him.

Still, he knew Karen was the best partner he had ever had. Unlike his former partner, Terry Jansen – he quickly suppressed the thought – she would put her life on the line for him, without hesitation. Their partnership had never faced that ultimate test, but he had no doubt about how she would react. He would do the same for her. But his greatest fear remained, unspoken and almost unacknowledged, even to himself: would he be able to protect her if the need arose?

It sometimes surprised him to think of that other Jim, who would have seen Karen first and foremost as a potential conquest. He occasionally thought a little wistfully about how he used to be able to connect with a woman with a single look. But he wasn't that Jim any more, and he didn't want to be – even if it was still possible. And he wouldn't trade his partnership with Karen for a transitory conquest.

He felt the car turn to the right and stop. "We're here," Karen said curtly.

Half an hour later, after the ME confirmed the grim details of the DOA's death, they headed back to the car.

"At least he was already dead when the . . . mutilation happened," Karen observed.

Jim nodded gravely. After a moment, he added, "If the ME's right that he was killed somewhere else and dumped in that alley – and I think she is – it won't do much good to re-canvass the neighborhood."

"Yeah," Karen agreed, "and until we get an ID on the kid, it's gonna be hard to trace his movements last night. I'm guessing he was a street kid, a runaway."

"Probably."

"What d'you think the motive was?"

Jim shrugged. "Who knows? Could be revenge. Or maybe he pissed off someone – big time. Or it could be a serial."

Karen shuddered. "You think there are other cases like this?"

"I don't know, but we need to look for them. One thing's for sure – whoever did this is a twisted son of a bitch."

"Yeah. When we get back, you can look for other cases," Karen suggested, "and I can check out the missing persons reports – you know, the pictures."

"OK," Jim replied absently, finding the handle and opening the car door. "Any idea how long Marty and Tom are gonna be stuck on the gang task force?"

"Another couple weeks, I think. We could sure use them on this one."

"Yeah."

They rode back to the 8th Precinct in silence and got to work. A couple of tedious hours later, Jim stood up and stretched, rotating his neck and shoulders. "You got something?" Karen asked.

"Nope. Just need a break." He started down the aisle between their desks, then stopped and turned to face Karen. Adopting the slightly sheepish half-grin he knew would defuse her anger, he said, "I'm sorry – you know, about this morning."

Karen shrugged it off. There was no point in staying mad at him. "No problem. The scene was pretty bad. I guess it gave you some nasty pictures in your head, huh?"

"Something like that," Jim agreed, heading for the locker room. He'd explain later. Besides, he decided as he sat next to the window with a cup of coffee, it wasn't such a big deal. He could still do his job. And he didn't have any real visual memories of the people he worked with, anyway. It wasn't as if he knew what Karen – or any of them – really looked like. So if he could no longer imagine what they looked like, he wasn't losing anything, right?

He smiled to himself as he remembered asking Karen what she looked like, on his second day back on the job. Now, four years later, it seemed so – irrelevant. Karen was the faint scent of her shampoo and cologne, her leather-clad arm under his hand when she guided him, her tough-cop voice – its edges sometimes softened by concern for him, her fierce loyalty, her intuitiveness and acute intelligence. What difference did it make what she looked like? None at all. Not to him.

Jim was mildly surprised to realize he'd never even wondered what his new boss looked like. Lt. Brian Walters had arrived at the 8th Precinct two months earlier, after Lt. Fisk's promotion to the staff of the new Chief of Detectives, who had succeeded the now-retired Chief Tunney. Jim often wondered whether Fisk's promotion was a reward for his handling of the NYPD's hottest hot potato, or in spite of it. He could hear Christie reminding him, "It's not always about you, Jimmy." But Jim was certain Fisk's support for him had delayed his boss's well-deserved promotion. He had no illusions. Even after four years, there were still plenty of people in the higher echelons who wanted him to fail. To his relief, Lt. Walters had been content so far to run the squad with a light hand, letting the detectives – himself included – do their jobs with a minimum of interference. But the man was so politically correct, Jim wondered how he'd not only survived in the NYPD, but also risen to the rank of lieutenant. He'd overheard Tom and Marty joking about it, and he found it pretty funny himself. No one else in the Department had ever been concerned about offending _him_. Not that he was complaining about it. He finished his coffee and headed back to his desk.

Lt. Walters emerged from his office as the end of the tour approached. "Anything?" he asked Karen and Jim.

"Not really," Karen answered. "So far, all of the missing kids who might be our DOA are accounted for."

Walters turned to Jim. "Anything to report, Jim?"

Jim shook his head. "No homicides in the City match this one. Either the perp hasn't killed before, or we need to expand our search beyond the City."

Walters nodded thoughtfully. "OK. You can pick things up in the morning. And if you need me to pull Russo and Selway back from the task force, just say the word."

"Thanks, boss," Karen said. Walters started back to his office.

"Lieutenant?"

He stopped and looked back at Jim. "Yes, Jim?"

"We're gonna get the son of a bitch."

"Yeah."

After Walters disappeared into his office, Karen put on her coat. "See you tomorrow."

Jim raised his head. "Yeah. Good night," he answered. He removed his earpiece, shut down his computer, and headed for the subway – and home.

The train rocked from side to side as it traveled through the tunnel under the East River, on its way to Brooklyn. Jim smiled, looking forward to getting home. He had found a fulfillment in his family – his wife and twin daughters – that he never would have believed possible. The Dunbars' marriage wasn't perfect – far from it. There were still times when he fell back into his old habits of single-mindedness and self-absorption, shutting Christie out, and she responded predictably, slipping into her passive-aggressive mode. But they hadn't spent all that time in couples counseling for nothing. They had learned how to recognize that pattern and break out of it before it drove them apart. It wasn't easy, but their hard work had paid off. Jim remembered Dr. Galloway's long-ago advice to treat his blindness as an opportunity for a fresh start with his wife. He'd never regretted taking that advice.

As he thought of Christie, he summoned up the image of her that he carried in his mind. There was a brief mental flash of something, then – nothing. He tried again, thinking of her long dark hair and the way it contrasted with her light blue-green eyes. Still nothing. The memory that had flashed so quickly across his mind was gone, somewhere beyond his ability to retrieve it. Nothingness seemed to close in on him, in a way he hadn't experienced since he was newly blind. He felt sick. "No," he whispered involuntarily, not knowing – or caring – if any of his fellow passengers noticed.

Later that evening, when dinner was over and the twins were asleep in their room, Jim sat on the couch, his legs stretched out in front of him and a bottle of beer in his hand. As much as he loved and delighted in his daughters, it was hard for him to relax until they were in their cribs. They had almost reached their third birthday, but the end of the "terrible twos" was nowhere in sight. He could never have imagined the chaos that two active toddlers could create. And the idea of "Daddy can't see" was still beyond their comprehension. Jim had lost track of the number of times he'd tripped over one of their toys, but at least he'd never fallen over one of the girls. Christie swore they instinctively knew to stay out of his path, but Jim had his doubts. He thought it was probably dumb luck – something he'd learned every parent, sighted or blind, needed now and then.

He heard Christie moving around in the kitchen, then her footsteps coming toward him. She sat down next to him and took his hand. "You're awfully quiet tonight," she said, sounding concerned. "Is something wrong?"

He set his beer on the coffee table and turned to face her. "Something's happening. . . I don't know, it must've been happening for a while, but I only noticed it today. . . ."

"What's that?" she prodded gently.

He bowed his head. "I'm forgetting," he said finally. "You know, forgetting what things look like – people, too."

"They said that would happen eventually," she said matter-of-factly, hoping her voice didn't reveal her feelings. Jim had already lost so much. Now he would have to find a way to deal with another irreversible loss. Her heart ached for him.

"I know." He fell silent, resting his chin on his hands and seeming to look away from her, across the room.

"Is something else bothering you?" she asked.

He turned back toward her, looking downcast. "No, it's just – coming home on the train tonight, I tried to think of what you look like, and I – I couldn't remember. I always thought, even if I lost other people, I wouldn't lose you."

Christie blinked back tears. She didn't know what to say. She reached out and rubbed Jim's shoulder, trying to establish a connection while she wondered what she could possibly say to him. Finally she spoke. "You haven't lost me," she said firmly. She took his hand and placed it on her cheek. He caressed her cheek briefly, then let his hand fall back to his lap. She looked at him thoughtfully, then said, "You know, Jimmy, that picture of me in your head wasn't real anymore. I'm five years older now, and – "

"It's pretty damn real when it's all you've got," he snapped.

"But doesn't this – forgetting – come from acceptance?"

"I guess. But as long as I could see things – in here," he tapped his forehead, "it was like I wasn't so – cut off from everything. It was like – "

She finished the sentence for him. "Like you were less blind?"

"'Less blind'?" he asked incredulously.

"All I'm saying is – if you're forgetting things, it means you're moving on."

He shrugged. "Maybe."

"You know, Jimmy, it's OK to let those memories go."

"Easy for you to say."

"I didn't say it would be easy. But I think you need to do it."

"I guess," he said doubtfully. He bit his lip.

She stood up and faced him, then took both of his hands in hers and tried to pull him up. He didn't move. "Come to bed," she coaxed.

"In a minute."

Christie's footsteps disappeared into the bedroom. Jim remained behind on the couch, his head bowed, the bottle of beer forgotten on the coffee table. He lost track of time as he struggled to come to terms with what was happening to him. Finally, he realized Christie was right. Losing his visual memories was the next step in the journey of his blindness. He would have to find a way to live with it.

He stood up and made his way to the bedroom. It had been a long day, and he had a killer to track down tomorrow.


End file.
